Megan Rapinoe Used to Hoop, too!

Summer is here!  The barbecues are starting, fireworks and mini American flags are on sale everywhere, and the sun is finally shining in Seattle with WNBA basketball under way.  I've taken the kayak out already and saw some seals and I've lost and found my sunglasses at least three times with the bipolar nature of the weather in Seattle. I've been working on a blog post about sport specialization for a while, and it has been  moving too slowly for me - primarily because I've been spending a lot less time at my computer and a lot more time in the sunshine when it comes out, but also because other topics just keep popping up that I want to write about. And then I decided I really wanted to write about the United States Women's Soccer Team this week, but... that's what everyone else has been doing.  And so, I decided to combine the two.


First,  I'll start with a definition.  In 2002, Jayanthi et al defined sport specialization as "intensive, year-round training in a single sport at the exclusion of other sports."  This came along with: “The American academy of pediatrics and the American medical society for sports medicine have both discouraged sport specialization before adolescence but acknowledge that this recommendation is largely based on expert opinion...” What does it mean?  It means that medical professionals are supporting playing multiple sports, moving in multiple different ways, participating in unorganized play that isn't a sport at all - just like playing games of tag or riding bikes around the neighborhood, or climbing a tree - so that the body moves in different ways.  

There are considerable benefits to playing sports.  Health benefits, of course, including improved heart rate and blood pressure, cardiovascular endurance, and muscular strength.  There are also mental health benefits, particularly with team sports - but also with individual sports - like community interactions, competitive spirit, sportsmanship, and having a support system.  But there are also risks.  That same article from Jayanthi also found that youth athletes with a higher socioeconomic status were more likely to sport specialize and were also more likely to experience more serious overuse injuries than lower socioeconomic status athletes.  It was also found that those youth athletes who participated in team sports tended to have less frequent overuse injuries than individual sports.

Myer et al provides some interesting statistics about the success from sport specialization: Approximately 30% of American kids specialize in one sport with the goal of earning a scholarship and reaching the professional level in that sport, but only .2-.5% make it to the elite levels. Many parents and, more dangerously, coaches believe that focusing on one sport is the way to reaching this goal.  But using the same patterns over and over again may not help develop resiliency and strength in other movement patterns. 

Some quotes from that paper:

"Single-sport specialization was first reported in Eastern Europe with athletes involved in individual sports such as gymnastics, swimming, diving, and figure skating."

"Vaeyens and colleagues59 reviewed the training history of 2004 Olympians and found that the mean age of sport initiation was 11.5 years."

"At the collegiate level, a study of National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division 1 athletes at one university found that 70% did not specialize in their sport until at least age 12 years, and 88% had participated in more than one sport."

Since I had already been doing research for a blog post on sports specialization, I looked into the roster of the USWNT and all the other sports those athletes played - other than soccer.  Here's what I've found.

Morgan Brian played varsity basketball through her senior year of high school before specializing in soccer.
Adrianna Franch was an all star high school basketball player.
Ashlyn Harris liked to surf and skateboard with her brother.
Tobin Heath reportedly likes tennis and surfing.
Jessica McDonald played four years of high school basketball and was a state champion and record holder in the 400m in track, also participating in the same three sports for two years of junior college before heading to North Carolina where she specialized.  The USWNT has a really long list of Tar Heels and a few Penn State Nittany Lions and Stanford Cardinal grads...I guess those would be the college power houses for women's soccer the way UConn is for women's basketball. 
Alex Morgan is listed as a multi-sport athlete.  As one of the most recognized athletes on the team, I think it's important to note that she tore her ACL when she was 17 and recovered to the extremely high level of play that she currently is at. In this chat, she says she started playing soccer around age 7 or 8, but played volleyball, basketball, and softball as well and didn't start playing club soccer until she was 14 years old.
Alyssa Naeher, my fellow Connecticut native, also played basketball in high school. 
Christen Press, (who I was insanely lucky to sit next to on a flight from Hartford to Chicago last summer in which the entire USWNT was on the plane and Sam Mewis sat behind us) played tennis and ran track before heading to Stanford for college. 
Megan Rapinoe played basketball and ran track.  
Becky Sauerbrunn also played basketball and volleyball. 

Megan Rapinoe celebrating the Storm Championship

Abby Dahlkemper, Tierna Davidson, Crystal Dunn, Julie Ertz, Lindsey Horan, Ali Krieger (did you know Krieger is German for warrior?!), Rose Lavelle, Carli Lloyd, Allie Long, Sam Mewis, Kelley O'Hara, Mallory Pugh, and Emily Sonnett - are not listed to play another sport on wikipedia, though that doesn't mean they didn't or haven't.  It most likely just means they didn't play another sport in high school and specialized before then, perhaps even playing something else through middle school.  Having ten out of 23 players noting what other sports they played until about age 18 has to help demonstrate the value in playing multiple sports!

So, what should we do about it?  We need to advocate for kids to play, to have recess, to move more, and to support participation in more than one sport.  My mentor from PT School, Lindsay DiStefano refers to this as Sport Sampling.  (I'm not sure if she coined this term, but it's the first place I ever heard it, and I like the idea - sample different activiites, find the ones you like, and move more!)  "Parents and educators should help provide opportunities for free unstructured play to improve motor skill development and youth should be encouraged to participate in a variety of sports during their growing years to influence the development of diverse motor skills" again Myer et al. 

And so, it's summer time.  Let your kids go out and play.  Run at the beach, play tag, kick a ball around, throw a frisbee, swim!  Don't let them play the same sports all year round.  And watch other sports too... like basketball, because now it's game time, and I'm off to go watch the Seattle Storm in action, hopefully with soccer star Megan Rapinoe in attendance!